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R ICH AR 1 ) C H ENO \V KT 1 1 
The Famous Pioucer 



Chenoweth Massacre 



Introduction 



/^■p^HIS historical account of the "Chenoweth 
IIL Massacre," near Ijouisville, in 1789, was 
^^ read by its author, Mr. Alfred Pirtle of 
Louisville, Ky., at the meeting of the State His- 
torical Society on the third of October, 1911. It 
was listened to with profound attention by the 
large audience. A number of the Chenoweth 
descendants were present, and were gratified to 
hear an historical account of the terrible tragedy 
that to them had been a handed-down tradition. 

It will add another interesting book to our 
series. 

We combine with it the Petitions and Appeals 
of the Pioneers in Kentucky to the Honorable 
Continental Congress, 1780-1783. 

These Petitions were to have been read at thei 
meeting of the State Historical Society on the 
third of October, also, but were omitted on ac- 
count of the limited tim^e. 

These valued memorials were obtained for the 
Kentucky Historical Society from the Mss. of Con- 
tinental Congress, State Dept., Washington, D. 
C, by our valued contributor to the Register, A. C. 
Quisenberry, and are published for the first time, 
because of the value to Kentuckians of the list of 
names of the pioneers, from whom so many fami- 
lies in Kentucky are descended, and some of them 
are ignorant of the nationality of their ancestors, 



as many of them are of their sacrifices, their pri- 
vations and their splendid courage to found a 
home and an inheritance for their descendants in 
the then wildernesses of Kentucky, surrounded by 
savages and wild beasts. 

Mrs. Jennie G. Morton, 

Editor The Register. 



The Chenoweth Family 
Massacre 



BY 

ALFRED PIRTLE 

Louisville, Ky. 
1909 




SPRING HOUSE— SCENE OF THE CHENOWETH MAS- 
SACRE ON JULY 17. 1789. 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

/^mi^lilS event was the end of the organized 
\9\j inroads of the Indians into Jefferson 
County, Kentucky, and made a decided 
sensation at that date, but records of it, at this 
length of time, since its happening, are not full 
nor easy to find. 

The name Chenoweth is of uncertain origin, 
though known since 1700, in America, when John; 
Chenoweth came ov«r from Wales. Family tradi- 
tion has it that the name is a false pronunciation 
of the French word Chenevix, meaning originally, 
goose foot, a nickname given to one whose toes, 
two or more, grew united. There lives now one of 
the name, who says, as a matter of fact, the sec- 
ond and third toes of his father 's feet were united 
at the base, that his are, and some of his descend- 
ants. 

Be that the cause of the family name or not, 
the John Chenoweth, mentioned above, married in 
Maryland, a daughter of the third I^ord Balti- 
more, by whom he had two sons and two daugh- 
ters. Arthur Chenoweth, the eldest son, became 
the father of a large family, whom he reared in 
Maryland. Richard, the other son, born in 1718 
or 1720, migrated about 1745 to Virginia, and not* 
a great while after married Margaret (Peggy) 
McCarthy. While the Revolutionary war was in 
progress, glowing accounts reached the family of 



The Cbenowetb Massacre 

the richness and beauty of the country beyond the 
mountains, becoming known as Kentucky, where 
lands could be had almost for the asking. 

The growing family had wants that must be 
supplied and Chenoweth realized that his knowl- 
edge of his craft as a carpenter and builder would 
be in demand in that new country, where the 
structures would largely be of wood, right from 
the forest in which the settlements were being 
made. 

Lt. Col. George Rogers Clark was in Virginia 
in the winter of 1777-8 urging on the governor his 
plans for the invasion of the British territory 
north of the Ohio river, contemplating a grand 
scheme of capture that would embrace Detroit, 
Kaskaskia and Vincennes, His plans were ap- 
proved and men and money provided. 

"We do not know how it came about, but Rich- 
ard Chenoweth, his wife, Margaret, and his chil- 
dren, Mildred, Jane, Thomas and James, em- 
barked with other families, at Redstone, now 
Brownsville, on the Monongahela river, and! 
under the protection of Clark and his force of] 
almost two hundred men, floated down to Fort 
Pitt (now Pittsburgh) and thence on the Ohio 
river, until May 27, 1778, they landed on Corn 
Island, in the edge of the falls of the Ohio. With 
the assistance of the soldiers, a small enclosure 
was raised on the island to protect the families, 
those soldiers who were selected to remain, and 
the military stores. Col. Clark had decided to, 
leave behind when he started on his wav down the 



The Cbenoweth Massacre 

Ohio, which he did June 24th.* The settlers imme- 
diately on their arrival had planted corn on thd 
island which gave it its name. 

When Clark sent dispatches from Kaskaskia, 
telling of his capture of that position he included 
in the message an order for the soldiers and set- 
tlers, to begin at once, and as soon as possible 
erect a fort on the main land. Richard Cheno- 
weth was the man selected to build the fort, which 
was located at a point on the highest bank of the 
river, near a spring, just where the Conrad Shoe* 
Company's factory now is, on the south side of 
Rowan street, not far east of Twelfth street. 

This fort, the first within the confines of 
Louisville, was about two hundred feet long by 
one lumdred wide, having eight log cabins on 
the east and west sides, the length of the enclos- 
ure, and four cabins across the ends. Although it 
was not entirely finished, it was sufficiently so to 
have a house-warming and the first dance given iri 
the new settlement December 25, 1778. 

In 1782 Clark, raised to the rank of brigadier 
general, began a fort some distance up the river 
bank from the first fort, and Richard Chenoweth 
is said to have been a contractor for work or ma- 
terials in its construction, and the State of Vir- 
ginia, not paying hun, he failed fimancially. 

''The fort here mentioned** was in 1782, suc- 
ceeded by a larger one, built by the regular troops, 



♦This date has been given as June 24th, June 26th and July 
4th. The writer takes it that it was June 24th, because the cap- 
ture of Kaskaskia was early in July. 

**It was on the bank of the river, near what is now the 
Northeast corner of Twelfth and Rowan Streets. 



The Cbenowetb Massacre 

assisted by the militia from all the settled parts 
of the district. It was situaited between the pres- 
ent Sixth and Eighth streets, on the northern side 
of Main street, immediately on the bank of the 
River. In honor of the third Republican gov- 
ernor of Virginia, the fort was called Fort Nelson. 
Seventh Street passed through the first gate op- 
posite to the headquarters of General Clark. The 
principal militlary defence in this part of the 
country deserves a few more particulars. It con- 
tained about an acre of ground, and was sur- 
rounded by a ditch eight feet wide and ten feet 
wide, intersected in the middle by a row of sharp 
pickets; this ditch was surmounted by a breast- 
work of log pens or enclosures filled with the 
earth obtained from the ditch, with pickets ten feet 
high planted on the top of the breastwork. Next 
to the river, pickets alone were deemed sufficient 
aided by a high slope of the river bank. Some of 
the remains of these pickets were dug up in the 
summer of 1832, in excavating the cellar of Mr. 
John Love's stores on Main Street opposite to the 
Louisville Hotel. There was artillery in the fort, 
particularly a double fortified brass piece, which 
was captured by Clark at Vincennes. This piece 
played no inconsiderable part in the military 
operations of this period, insignificant as it may 
appear to the eyes of a regular military critic." 
This description is taken from BufJer's History 
of Kentuckv, edition 1836, pp. 63-64. 

Riichard Ohenowetli was more or less pronw- 
nent in the early history of the PaUs of the Ohio, 
afterwards called liouisville. He was the Sheriff 

10 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

of Kenitucky County, Va., at tihe time Clark bead- 
ed the expedition from Kentucky, that assembled 
at the m)Outh of Licking River, marched into Ohio, 
and did such severe damlage tio the homes of the 
Indians that fall of 1782, that the savages never 
again invaded Kentucky with as large and well or- 
ganized body of warriors, though they kept up the 
horrors of such warfare for about tien years. Th<: 
story goes that Clark seized a barrel of liquor, and 
took (it away on his boat that formed part of thd 
expedition from Louisville. TOiiaiti liquor had not 
been paid for, when Clark returned, and the citi- 
zen who owned the liquor, got out some kind of a 
papei" for the sheriff to serve on Greneral dark, 
but the sheriff was too wily ib try to take the gen- 
eral before the court, and directed one of his depu- 
ties to serve the paper. General Clark said he 
took the liquor in the public service, for the use of 
men defending the home of the owner, and lie was 
ready to go to court if the deputy could t^ke him. 
amd he had bettler not try it. 

The deputy was convinced that he could not 
take the General, under the circumstances. This 
incident is mentioned to show that Richard Chen- 
oweth was well known then. Not long after 
the retfurn of Clark's expedition, Chenoweth, 
about 1785, became a part owner of a fine tract 
of land on one of the tributaries of Floyd's 
Fork, not far from Col. Floyd's station or fort. 
Jefferson County at that time had quite a num- 
ber of small forts or stations, as some of them 
were called. They were none of them forts in 
the usual semse of the term, because the most 

11 



The Cbenoweth Maaaacre 

part of themi was usually wood, cut by the wood- 
man from the trees felled for the purpose, aind 
made into rude cabins or stockades, which were 
logs split, sharpened at the upper end, tall 
enough to keep a foe from climbing over unless 
assiisited by a ladder, and put so close together 
that the edges miet, and the wood was hea\y 
enough to stop the rifle balls then in service. 
Such fences were of no avail against cannon, but it 
was a fortunate thing for tihe early settlers that 
artillery did not accompany but one incursion ot 
the savages into Kentucky in the long years that 
such warfare was so cruelly waged. 

Ohenoweth's lands were on a rolling country 
bordering a small stream, not more than two 
mliles, or three, perhaps, east of Middletown, and 
some mjiles northwest froim Floyd's Station. 

He built a substantial and for that time a 
good sized log cabin, erected a stone spring house 
over the spring nearest the house, making it a 
kind of fortress in oaisie of attack by the Indians, 
and putting in rafters, made a loft to it, and en- 
'tered from below by a ladder, or by a window 
from the outside, if one could scale the wall. He 
cleared considerable land, and was raising crops 
the summer of 1787. A great-grandson now liv 
ing. Dr. W. J. Chenoweth, of Decatur, HI., says : 

"The family had now been living at their 
cabin long enough to plant corn, sow wheat and 
rye and build fences, and feel secure from In- 
dians. ' ' 

A daughter Naomi was bom after they 
settlled in Louisville, but the date is not obtain 
able, and she was at least about six years old. 

12 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

Dr. Chenoweth says: ''One morning in 
June, 1787, after a shower of rain in the night, 
they (the family) discovered that their horses 
were not in the barn. Seeing plain tracks along fhe 
road, they followed them about a mile when they 
discovered the animlals grazing at the jmiction of 
the corn field and a field of rye, and VhUe leis- 
urely approaching them were suddenly shot at 
from a sink hole not many feet distant. James 
Chenoweth, grandfather of Dr. Chenoweth, then 
ton years old,* accompanied his father and uncle 
in their hunt for the horses and seeing the In- 
dians as they arose from their hiding places, 
struck out for home, the Indians following, evi- 
dently intending to capture him,. But finding 
he ran too fast for capture, shot at him with bow 
and arrow, the arrow carrying an iron head. Pull- 
ing the arrow from his hip while rimning, he 
imet Ms mother (who had heard the report of the 
guns) with tiwo guns in her armls speeding lo 
meet her husband. Jim, as he was called, cried 
out to her : ' ' They killed Dad and Gid, but they 
didn't catch me." He had mjade what he claimed 
in telling the story, "a stiraight shErt tail" — his 
only clothing was a tow linen shirt. 

When Jaanes pulled the arrow from his 
wound after being shot, as before stated, he did 
not realize that part of the head remained in the 
wound, which for a long timje pained him so 
severelv that he was convinced that something 



*Born in Berkley County,, Va., May 17, 1777. 
13 



The Cheaoweth Massacre 

had been left in his hip, and Dr. Knight from 
Louisville was oailled in to remove whaitever 
(might be tJh'e object. 

The following account given by him to a 
grandson, shows how dreadfully our ancestors 
suffered when a surgical operation was i.)er- 
formied. 

"The doctor placed him on a chair, with his 
face to the back of it, and without giving an opi- 
ate or miaking any attempt to alleviate the pain, 
cut dovm to the object and removed an iron ar- 
row head which had penetrated to the bone, and 
turning, was coursing its way out. The wound 
healed rapidly and he soon became stronger than 
he had ever l>een." 

He was mistaken; his father and uncle had 
evaded the Indians by hiding in the rye field, 
His mother had heard the shots, and divining the 
cause, had hurried out to give aid. 

Thomas Chenoweth, the boy older thatn 
James, (some timie before the adventure of 
James \Vith the Indians), was riding one day 
homeward from the mill with the meal made from 
the com he had taken to be ground, mounted on a 
gentle horse to which he was so mfuch accustom 
ed that he was lying back on the bag of xfxet\\ with 
his legs stretched out towards the horse's head. 
Though barefooted, he had fastened a pair of 
spurs to his ankles, which were hanging on each 
side of the neck of the animal, which stumbled, 
throwing Thomas forward onto the horse's neck. 
Instinctively Thomas clasped his legs aroimd 
the neck, causing the spurs to gouge the horse, 

14 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

whicli sprang foi"ward, depositing the boy on the 
ground. Kising to pursue the horse, Thomas 
found several Indians around him, who mjaide 
him their prisoner, and took him to the home of 
their tribe in Ohio, where he remained for years 
until exchanged for an Indian chief, who had been 
held in captivity by the whites some time. Thomas 
therefore, could not have been at home when the 
Indians made their foray upon it. He had be 
come so much of an Indian in manner and habits 
that it required years of residence among the 
whites to remove the miost of the traces of his 
life aonong the savages. 

It is far from easy to extract from the vari- 
ous accounts preserved and tbld, the story of 
what happened to his family two years after the 
attack stated above. 

Let u'si see if we can imagine the famlily at 
supper on July 17, 1789. 

Richard Chenoweth and Peggy, his wife, 
Mildred, James, Jane, «n.d Naomi, and a man 
nam'ed Bayless, who with John Rose, a well 
known man in the neighborhood, were either 
guards or working men. There were, besides, 
several slaves on the place, for the hard work of 
farming was largely done by the negroes who im- 
migrated with their masters' families from Vir- 
ginia. You must never lose sight of fhe fact that 
all the face of the country was covered by great 
trees that had to be remioved with hard labor, be 
fore buildings could be built', roads opened or 
fields made ready for farming. We of the pres- 
ent day cannot estimate the arduous, never end- 
is 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

ing, continuous struggle waged by our ancestors 
to give us the land we live in, under the skies of 
Old Kentucky. The negroes are not mentioned 
in the accounts of the attalok and resulting dis 
aster to them save mlosit casually, as if they were 
units only in the general result. 

While the family were at supper on the even- 
ing of July 17, 1789, lingering over the table, they 
were suri)rised by a party of sixteen Shawnee In- 
dians, suddenly opening the door and nishing in. 
As the door swung back, Mr. Rose jumped behind 
it, and in the dreadful confusion he slipped out un- 
discovered and escaped. The children, except 
Naomi, who was in bed, and the rest of the party, 
struggled out of the house at various points. Rich- 
ard Chenoweth and Millie were wounded, the girl 
in the arm, but they made their way to the spring 
house, or into tihe woods. What became of Jane, 
does not seem to have been recorded. James was 
asleep in a chair near the door, leaning againsc 
the wall, but he was thrown tlo the floor, and he 
fled, but not before the Indians had given him a 
terrible blow with a tomahawk, making a wound 
from the hair almost down to his cheek. Dr. Chen- 
oweth hiah printed a brief statement of the tradi- 
tion given him by his grandfather, James (the 
boy). *'He first hid in a log-heap of fire wood, and 
an Indian dog walked over the woodpile evidently 
scenting him, but finally left without finding him. 
After the Indians had left the cabin he got from 
his hiding place and started for the block house at 
Middletown, but lost his way, and crouched be- 
tween the rooitls of a} large beech tree. He had 

16 



The Chenoweth Mass&cre 

l^een tliere but a, few inlinutes until his do^ came 
up and licked his hands and face. Putting hia 
hand tio his face to ward off the dog he discovered 
his face wtas so covered with blood, that he was 
certain he had been cut with a scalping knife ; put- 
ting Ms hand tk) his head, expecting to come in 
contact with the raw surface of his skull, he was 
greatly relieved to find his scalp had not been 
ftiaken. When daylight enabled him to find the 
road, he started for the fort. He had gone but a 
short distance when he miet an armed company, 
going tto look for the dead at the scene of the mas- 
siacre. ' ' 

Mrs. Chenoweth (Feggy) had been shot with 
an lairrow as she fled and fell some distance from 
the house in the direction of the spring hou-se. 

It becomes necessary now to bring in here an 
account of the awful torture of this remarkable 
woman, which the writer of this sketfeh found in 
an unfinished manuscript now in the hands of Col. 
E. T. Durrett, written by the late Gov. Charles 
Anderson who lived at and founded the town of 
Kuttawa, Ky., and was for years a member of the 
I^lson CEub. (See Appendix.) 

He intended to write the life of his father, 
Richard Clough Anderson, of Virginia, whose 
family have been so illustriously connected with 
the history of Kentucky and Ohio, but it seems 
Gov. Anderson, either did not complete the work, 
or the manuscript has been partly lost. 

In 1789, Riclmrd Clough Anderson lived in a 
fine double log cabin, at a place he named ** Sol- 
dier's Retreat" about two miles west of Middle- 

17 



T/w Chenoweth Massacre 

town, which would make it nearly five miles from 
Ohenoweth's station, as that spot was northeast 
of Middletown about three miles. 

Gov. Andersion tells the story in the sityle 
peculiar to his pen, in such an interesting man- 
ner, that it is all introduced here. The letter he 
speaks of is one to some member of the fa/mily 
back in Virginia. 

From an unfinished manuscript left by tfhe 
late Ex-Grovemor Charles Anderson, of Koittawa, 
Ky.: 

"This letter contains another perhaps val- 
uable historic point — the massacre at Chenoweth 's 
Station (some two miles northeast of Middle- 
town on "the divide" between Beairgrass and 
Floyd's Fork.) By this letlter we discover that its 
date was just before August 22, 1789.* My father 
led the company to attack the savages if access- 
ible and to rescue and to save, if possible, the 
captives or wounded. 

"Tlie Battle of Blue Licks (Aug. 18, 1782) 
closed the epoch of great warfare between the 
Indians aind the pioneer settlers in Kentucky. 
Occasional forays by small volunteer parties of 
Indians still for a few years continued to alarm, 
plunder and often to nmssacre our people. .Such 
a party in the summer of 1789 had penetrated the 
Pond settlement and with Little Mischief had re 
crossed the Ohio River above Salt River. An- 
other like savage foray was miade in the Pond 
settlement. They were pursued into Indiana Ter- 
ritorv bv Col. Wm. Christian (the beloved 



*The official report to the Government makes it July 17, 1789. 

18 



The Ch»DOwetb Massacre 

brother-in-law of Patrick Henry) with Alexander 
Scott Bullitt and dtHier friends. In this unfortu- 
nate expedition the gallant, generous and pure- 
minded philafnthropist and hero, Col. Christian, 
was slain. Col. (Major!) Hardin marched with 
a small body of volunteers to punish that party 
and they killed two Indians and returned in safety. 
The former event was a tragic and grievous one to 
our nearest neighbors and best friends, tlie 
mourning Christian and Bullitt families. But 
this expedition to i. e. Chenoweth Station came 
still closer to Col. Anderson's family. William 
Clark then sixteen (?) years old, was an appren 
tice in the surveyor's business in his offjce. ''Lit- 
tle Billy" as his sister calls him in her contem- 
porary letter, volunteered and was permitted by 
his governors to march in this hazardous affair. 
But a betJter fortune than the Christian expedition 
ensued, and so it turned out that Master Billy's 
very red scalp was saved to invite the admiration 
of the Indians long afterward from the mouth of 
the Missouri River to that of the Columbia. The 
hero of the Lewis and Clark expedition has told 
the writer that Wis red hair was often fingered and 
felt by warrior hands to discover if its wonderful 
color was painted or real, and their mouths seem- 
ed almost watered at the thought of lifting such 
a scalp-trophy as that. Of all their many and 
grand surprises of this pioneers' expedition of 
civilization, its cannon, etc., nothing so amazed 
and delighted all these nations clear to the mighty 
Oregon, "which hears no sound save his own 
dashing," excepting alone Captain Clark's black 

19 



The CbtDowetb AfAssacre 

slave (York), as did these gloriously red scalp 
locks. They often imitated its brilliancy by ver- 
milion paints^n the horse hairs of their calumets 
but, thank God, the genuine article was permitted 
by a special Providence to be worn on the honored 
head of this most genial and kindliest of uncles 
to his honored tomb at St. Louis on Sept 1, 1838. 
And tfhis brings us to the Chenoweth Massa- 
cre of our letter. It must have occurred, as before 
noted, in July or August, 1789, and wais probably 
the very last! of these tragic disasters in Ken- 
tuicky. I give as much of the tradition as I can 
recall. My father was then living in a double log 
house at Soldier's Retreat. A little before mid- 
night his vigilant wife heard moccasins approach- 
ing the door and awakened her husband with the 
alarm of "Indians!-' He took his rifle from its 
rack at the head of the bed and demlanded "Who's 
there." The instant rejyly was (as I remember it) 
"John Rose." The inquirer knew the voice, but 
being a little doubtful whether Rose as a pioneer 
of an Indian party might not be overawed by his 
captors in order to save his own life, to gain free 
admittance for them, started to cross question his 
neighbor, when Rose cut short all doubts and fears 
by vehemently exclaiming "For God's sake, Col- 
onel, let me in. I am just from Clienoweth's Sta- 
tion where the Indians have massacred every Hv- 
ing soul." There was a traveller from Virginia, 
one William Elliott, asleep upstairs. He was in- 
stantly awakened and liis horse ordered, and he 
was sent to some more distant station down the 
Creek — Floyd's or Stlurges, perhaps — and Rose 

20 



The Chenoweth Mass&cre 

was sent afoot to Lynn's station at the Big Spring, 
soane half a mile away across the Va^lley. Tihe 
county records claim the name of Lynn's Station 
for my father's purchase of the 900 acres from 
Col. Peyton Short. Nevertheless the then actual 
station was at the site afterwards and so long 
owned and occupied by his brofther-in-law, Ensign 
Robert Tompkins and his charming family. In a 
few hours the little j>arty of rescuers or avengers 
were on their march for the expected dreadful 
scene of carnage, and being only some four miles 
distant they reached it about' the morning dawn. 
As they were approaching the clearing they dis- 
covered a little fugitive boy of some six years old 
trying to hide or escape from; tlhem. My father 
recognized little Jimmy even through the matted 
blood on his hair and face. He had a horrid gash 
from a tomahawk which extended from the roots 
of his liair, through his forehead and down per- 
haps across his cheek. He calmed the child's 
fears, who was only afraid, he told them, that sup- 
posing him for an Lidian boy from his red face 
the white soldiers would kill him. My father took 
him on the pommiel of his saddle and rode on to 
the station. There was a scene of more silent 
desolation. The cows and calves, dogs and hogs, 
were apparently slaughtered. The house had been 
set on fire but the flames had died out. I have no 
recollection (strange to say) of the corpses, if 
any, seen there. I miust refer to the hisltories. if 
any, to settle their numbers, but my recollection, 
contrary to the statement in such matters later, 
was that the man killed or captured was a travel- 

21 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

mg soldier wlio had reached the station only thai 
day and not a hired hand, but he may have been 
both soldier and a hired hand. And the other 
story was only colored into a proper romance by 
the free fancies of ns traditioners — white or black. 
In tHie house they saw a little girl, some three or 
four years old, sitting on a mattress on the floor 
in a comer of the room, with her pussy in her 
lap. Our tradition in order to make the tragedy 
as perfect! and charming as possible almost al- 
ways had it a tolmiahawked kitten. Some of the re- 
peaters of this "o'ertrue tale" kept pussy alive 
for better ending, but this little girl certainly 
did speak and say, "we are all dead here. Colonel, 
but me." Our worthy traditioners alwaj^s add 
"and my pussy," and this is how sihe escaped the 
universal fate, as she and Rose then believed. 
An Indian seeing the mattress on the flooj" but 
seeing no one on it lifted it by the neair edge, rip- 
ped it open with his scalping knife and threw it 
back, with its loosened enfranchiised feathers upon 
the floor. Tliis awakened poor little Jimmty (if 
that was his name) ; one vigorous slash of the 
tomahawk into his thin little skull sufficed to finish 
him as the warrior supposed, and his little scalp 
was too little to briag or dlalnce over. But as we 
have seen and shall soon see, little Jimmy was by 
no means finished by that blow. As for little 
Naomi his bed-fellow% she blissfully and therefore 
safely slept through it all and so was saved with 
or without her pussy, as the case may be, or other- 
wise, as the reader miay prefer the different mem- 
ories of these two factions in the respective ver- 

22 



The Cbenoweth Massacre 

sio'iis, and each reader m!ay se'lect for him or her- 
self. As for this historian, he spoils Naomi's 
speech in complete justice to those Indian heroes. 
He oould not in hisi childhood believe that they 
would leave any creature alive upon which they 
had their eyes, and, besides, is it not a most pa- 
thetic pidture that of Naomi's constancy in loving* 
and petting her dead "pussy?" But let the read- 
ers * ' take their choice. ' ' 

After some searching they found poor Mrs. 
Chenoweth lying more dead than alive in the 
upper story of a little spring house. She had been 
shot as she ran, with an arrow between her 
shoulder-blades and stlumbling, fell. The Indian, 
probably supposing her killed, drew out his alrrow 
and at once placing his foot upon her, began his 
triumphant work of the scalping, and as her full 
head of jet-black hair composed a grand trophy, 
he cut from her that entire crown of woman's 
glory and as she tlold my father, th^tt savage surg- 
eiy was executed by the very dullest and jagged- 
est knife she had ever felt. Douibtless she was 
imade to regret that the benevolent British Indian 
traders had not supplied the Indians with whet- 
stones along with their scalping knives of better 
metal. At last, however, this ''Love's shining 
circle" was finished throughout its ruby line just 
above her ears, and thereupon, taking his bloody 
blade between his teeth, he leaned his entire 
weight upon the foot upon the arrow-wound in 
her back and by mlain force of both hands inter- 
tAvined in her ''gory locks ^' he tore off and strip- 
ped away the entire scalp from her naked skull. 

23 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

He then struck it tVice with the butt of his tonia- 
hawk, and all this time of her flight, wounding, 
fall and scalping, this woman was more than per- 
fectly — she was vividly conscious of its every 
moment and she feared and suffered throughout 
all without a shriek or murmur to suggest to her 
foe that she was living. You may cant in your 
speeches or poetise in your writing, to the fullest 
extent of your enthusiasm or affectations of it, ye 
gushing orators and poets, but where amongst 
your male heroes ''from the Macedonian to the 
Swede" can you parallel the heroism of this back- 
woods woman! It was a rare instance, indeed, 
in all history! But it must not be forgotten that 
these pioneer forests shadowed perhaps many 
women of that type— her like though perhaps not 
her equal. 

My father, who is said to have occupied some 
of his "too much time" as a pioneer in studying 
medicine and surgery, dressed Mrs. Chenoweth 's 
and little Jimmy's wounds and speedily set forth 
with his little band in pursuit of the Indians. But 
they were too well aware of their extreme danger 
in so late and distant an expedition to delay much 
"in the order of their going." Indeed, they rather 
fled than marched in their shortest time to their 
own part of the wilderness, beyond the Ohio. Thej^ 
were easily pursued to the crossing of Floyd's 
Fork due north, where the footprints confirmed 
their other signs tliati their numbers were at least 
equal to those of their pursuers, and as the op- 
posite hills and thickets would give them the 
infinite advantage of a safe ambuscade should 

24 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

they desperately elect to delay for battle, the 
Colonel (piamfully remiembering doubtless not 
only the ambushment and destruction of his friend 
Floyd's party in that immediate neighborhood, 
but the still more recent and terrible massacre at 
Blue Licks) decided with un'atnimous votes of his 
followers (for such was then the usage of military 
discipline in pioneer warfare) that discretion 
**was here" the better part of valor. Wherefore, 
and (let us hope) being also urged by the prompt- 
ings of his ardent pity for the suffering woman and 
boy beliind him, decided on not a retreat but a re- 
turn. These sufferers were accordingly conveyed 
to "Soldier's Retreat" where under the surgical 
supervisions and prescriptions of the host and lov- 
ing nursing of his young wife, they were soon 
restored to their pristine health and spirits. But 
the woman was, and but for the early use of caps 
would have remained, a startling if not funny 
spectacle. Our Bible avers that the woman is the 
glory of miam, and if a woman have long hair "it 
is a glory to her." "It is a shame for a woman 
to be shorn or shaven." But here had these God- 
less, impious savages shorn for her lifetime this, 
her crown of glory, as sleek as a peeled 
onion. The grotesque oddity of her appearance 
was said to hiafv^e been beyond any picturing by 
words. The first excitement and alanm from this 
bold and lately expected foray was both great and 
wide-spread. Partly from the extreme haste of 
these dus,ky warriors and in part, perhaps, from a 
sort of timed prudential policy, comparatively 
little harm was really done, but Rose's extrava- 

25 



The Cbeaoweth Maseacre 

gant panic was noiti singular. Our childhood's 
tradition assured us (amd what child at all doubts 
his own precious traditions?) that Milly Cheno- 
weth was at t(he cow-pen (ailways pronounced 
*'cuppen") with a beau as a guard, engaged in 
milking, when they heard the horrid onset at the 
house. Whereupon both fled in wildest terror to 
Soldier's Reiireat, where still bereft of their 
senses, they hid themselves in our spring house. 
Doubtless, this tradition, whether of blatck or 
white origin, with the customiary and native aver- 
sion of traditions to the truth, was a great ex- 
aggeration if not a lie cut out of the whole cloth. 
But the coining of it (if it were false) proves at 
least the extent of the first general terror, upon 
which the inventor of it relies for an easy 
credence. To finish for vafcrious kinsfolk our little 
romance — *'an o'er true tale", indeed — the Chen- 
oweths soon left Jeffe^rson Ooimty and settled in 
Lincoln, as I always heard, having* no idea then 
where ** Lincoln" was. I never recdved the pub- 
lished tradition, that my father in his trip to Vir- 
ginia, by a mere acicident! fell upon his early friend 
jamd patient in her far off Virginia home, though 
of course it may be true. She once certainly 
visited our later family, almlost within my mem- 
ory, but (and!) my eager romance-loving imagi- 
nation fondly pictures it as a personal memory. 
Naomi, now becomie an old maid, somehow and 
somewhere or other attracted the veteran love of 
an old neighbor, one of the most sensible, honest 
and worthy citizens of tlhe county near Bruners- 
town (JefPersontown, it is now more elegantly 

2e 



The Cbenoweth Mtuasacre 

called) and they were mlarried. I suppose our pix)- 
bate records will show that one of the first suits 
my brother Larz had in his large law practice 
(Pirtle and Anderson) was in 'the settlement of 
her side of the good estate of that most excellent 
man — she left no children. "VN^ien and where she 
died I do not know. But some time late in the 
fifties our little Indian-faced boy, Jimmy Cheno- 
weth, again suddenly emerges into the clean light 
of history. His son, a friend and client of the 
writer, brought his aged father, with no trace or 
shadow of the Beargrass life upon him except that 
tom'ahalwk gash in his forehead and cheek, to 
close his long life in the more welcome home of his 
excellent and pious son. And, strange ac- 
cident of chances, that home was on Pike 
Street, in Cincinnati, just opposite to the 
residence of my brother Larz. Unluckily for me 
— and a few readers may sunnise for themselves, 
also — I was absent in Texas during that interest- 
ing episode, but my brother and his crowd of little 
boys always athirst for '*real, sure Injun stories" 
most industriously pumped dry all the good old- 
man's memories and traditions about this tragedy 
of Chenoweth's Station. I have reserved for this 
connection one of these which I first gathered 
from this last memoir. After describing the gen- 
eral details pretty much as above given, old Mr. 
Chenoweth said that his mother often told him 
that she fully believed that her life was, after all, 
saved by the special interposition of Providence, 
in this wise : With her eyes almost blinded by the 
blood from her torn and naked skull, with her con- 

27 



The Chenoweth Maasacre 

sciousness for the first time greatly disturbed if 
not actually paralyzed by those hard blows of the 
tomahawk upon her head, then unshielded by hair 
or skin, and in a state of consequent half reckless 
despair, crawling along, she felt her dark, or 
dark red, way to her chosen hiding place over the 
spring house. But when at last, so wearily, faint - 
fully and painfully (for each stretching out of 
that arm or a leg gave a spasm of keenest pain to 
its wounded shoulder blade), she had reached the 
end of her narrow plank bridge, she found herself 
utterly unable to rise for walking above it or to 
crawl upon it over the rocky chasm. "What shall 
I do — what can I do — to save my life from these 
fiends in human shape?" she said to herself, 
(was her despairing but most silent last thought.) 
And there she lay in hopeless, blank despair, 
when two very different events startled her at- 
tention. The first was the wide flashing light 
from the kindling flames of the bed straw with 
which the Indians attempted to burn her beloved 
home, and their loudest war whoops with which 
they greeted this finishing of their deadly and tri- 
umphant devil's work. And the next event (for 
it became one) was as she now beheld in this liv- 
ing illumination that narrow pathway upon the 
plank and actually felt herself impelled by those 
horrid yells into a more resolved effort to escape 
over it. Just at this strange crisis between blind- 
ness and vision, between despair and a faint and 
fearful hope, without the least link or clue of as- 
sociation — there gleamed into her very soul a 
flash of memory, far brighter than the flames of 

28 



The Chfuowfth Massacre 

lier kindling home — these lines from a dear but 
forgotten old hymn — ' ' Jesus can make my path to 
shine" — and she ever said that she knew this was 
an inspiration from her Saviour, and therefore 
she firmly and as an act of faith, like Peter's 
walk upon the water, holding his Savior's hand, 
arose and safely walked that plank into salvation. 
Some of us lack the faith to accept hers. We may 
doubt, therefore, the divinity of that message or 
inspiration, but our coolest or most skeptical com- 
mon sense need not doubt that the natural influ- 
ence of these two conspiring events might have at 
•once encouraged and empowered her to undertake 
and perform that final effort. As for myself, I 
must think that this real heroine's explanation is 
by far the nobler of the two. 

Although in my other odd literary tastes I 
have a peculiar fondness for the exalted poetry 
of olden religious poems, I am and have been 
wholly unable to remember or to find this line 
from Mrs. Chenoweth's treasury. Neither did 
my brother remember it. It may be that my quot- 
ing of it from him is erroneous. His own memory 
•of words or in philology in general was so very 
wonderful that I know if there be an error in this 
repetition of it, that it must be my own, but I 
leave it for other living lovers of our old hymns 
to track up this now precious line to its native 
bed. It ought to be made classic with the devo- 
tees of Kentucky Pioneer History. 

Captain Chenoweth seems to have been one 
of the very first pioneers to the Falls of the Ohio„ 
I think be was w^ith Patton C. Bowman, etc., un- 

29 



The Chenowetb Massacre 

der Colonel George Rogers Clark in the encamp- 
ment on Corn Island. Of his fate the author 
knows nothing, but in order as usual, to connect 
the story of these times with as many families as 
possible, we add that this son of '^little Jimmy" 
married, besides other marriages, Julia Rogers, 
a daughter of our most worthy and eminent physi- 
cian, Dr. Coleman Rogers, Senior, and they left 
one daughter, but he had also one or two sons, 
and their descendants, wherever they are, if any 
survive, are the offspring from that Station 
Root." The last sentence ends the paper by Gov- 
ernor Anderson. 

Dr. W. J. Chenoweth, you will recall, is a 
grandson of Jimmy, of whom Col. Anderson 
speaks, and his narrative varies a little from the 
tradition in the Anderson family which Col. An- 
derson so graphically tells. 

You will remember that John Rose said the 
whole family had been killed, and that brings us 
to the further remarks of Dr. Chenoweth. 

"Tbey had no hope of finding anyone alive. 
The only person found was a little girl six years 
of age, sitting alone on the hearth, with petticoat 
thrown over her head. As soon as she saw that 
the intruders were not Indians, she asked them 
not to shoot her, and told them that everybody 
was dead. She had been asleep during the at- 
tack, and the Indians had pulled off the bedclothes 
from the bed on which she slept, rolling her to the 
floor. This did not wake her, so that she knew 
nothing whatever of the massacre of the family, 
only taking it for granted that their absence 

30 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

meant death at the hands of the Indians. Not 
finding anyone in the house, they searched the 
spring house, as before described, a stone build- 
ing two stories in height. The Indians had re- 
moved the ladder that was used to reach the up- 
per department, but on examining the lower, they 
found Peggy, as she was familiarly called, lying 
prone on the floor of the room with her hands 
raising water to her mouth, to quench the intoler- 
able thirst caused by loss of blood. Fortunate it 
was that their water supply was a spring instead 
of a well, for with blood flowing from seven knife 
cuts in her body, and the numerous blood vessels 
opened by loss of her scalp, it would have indeed 
been a miracle to have saved her life. At her best 
looking more like a girl of twelve than a woman of 
thirty, she had the endurance of a giant and the 
courage of a pioneer, who knew no such word as 
fear. She not only recovered with life, but with 
health and energy, and bore two children before 
the death of her husband in 1796." 

It will be noticed that the accounts of Gov- 
ernor Anderson and Dr. Chenoweth differ in some 
particulars, yet they agree on the general result, 
that the attack was sudden, unexpected and fatal 
to quite a number. The report to the Government 
at Washington* says three of the family were 
killed and seven wounded. Bayless, the compan- 
ion of Eose, was tortured and burned to death, 
somewhere between the house and spring house. 
Richard and Peggy Chenoweth, Millie, James 



♦Indian Affairs, Vol. 1, page 185. 
31 



TJie Clwuoweth Massacre 

and a woman named Rachael and two others 
wounded. The Indians plundered the premises 
of everything they could carry away, making good 
their escape across the Ohio. 

Eichard Chenoweth fully recovered and fol- 
lowed farming and house building until he met 
his death in 1796, as has been mentioned, while 
raising a house for a neighbor. The heroic Peggy 
/ lived for twenty years, bearing two girls to her 
husband, one of whom was called Tabitha; the 
name of the other is now forgotten. She lived af- 
ter her husband's death near a place called Big 
Spring, some five miles east of Shelby ville, Ky. 

She was not much larger than the usual girl 
of twelve years, and was always in a cap, for she 
was permanently hairless. Being very intelligent, 
she had a way of saying things to people that con- 
veyed a lesson or a criticism, in such terms as 
could not be taken as offensive, her smile and 
kind expression showing she was not angered. 

It was not possible to be neater in person or 
dwelling place than she — everything was in per- 
fect order. Tradition says nothing made her 
angry quicker than for anyone to enter her cabin 
with muddy shoes, 

Naomi, the baby of the massacre, married a 
Mr. Kalfus, and there she disappeared from the 
records. Tabitha in the 1840 's went as a mission- 
ary to the Indians in the West. 

James in time became a married man, and 
spent his early married life in the Big Sandy 
Country, but removed to Mercer county, where he 

32 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

lived many years. He died at the home of his 
son, John S. Chenoweth, in Cincinnati, January 
10, 1852. 

The Shelby branch of the Louisville & Nash- 
ville Railroad passes very near the spring house 
so celebrated in this bit of history, and the 14th 
mile post from Louisville is right opposite the 
building. The writer of this was inside of it Jan. 
27, 1909, and though it was one hundred and 
twenty years old, had had three roofs and the 
woodwork of the door and windows charred, 
the masonry was in good condition and the mor- 
tar very hard and strong. 

During the remarkable drouth of 1908 this 
spring supplied many families, some of whom 
came miles to get the cool, clear fluid. The sock- 
ets in the wall are plainly visible where the raft- 
ers were when Peggy threw herself down on the 
floor that the timbers bore in the little attic to the 
spring house. It is to be hoped that succeeding 
generations will always care for this humble little 
building, the reminder of the heroism and stoical 
endurance of that pioneer mother. 



33 



Appendix 



Charles Anderson was the seventh child of 
Richard Clough Anderson, Sr., and Sarah Mar- 
shall, both natives of Virginia. Born in Jeffer- 
son County, Kentucky, at his father's homestead, 
known far and wide as ''Soldier's Retreat," June 
1st, 1813, he became so marked a man of genius, 
numerous talents, and admirable in every way, 
that it is not possible, in the space that can be de- 
voted to his history here, to give anything like a 
picture of the man, that will do his memory jus- 
tice. His father's home was visited by all the dis- 
tinguished men of the day, nay, even the chiefs 
of the Indian tribes made it a stopping place, in 
those days when its fame of hospitality was wide- 
spread. Little Turtle, the great chief of the Mi- 
amis of Ohio, was a guest there several times. 

Charles was brought up in the society of the 
highest type of men and women of the day, and 
through life maintained an eminent place in such 
surroundings. 

Alt thirteen years of age he went with his 
mother to Chillicothe, Ohio, remained there un- 
til he was sent to Miami University at Oxford, 
Ohio, where he graduated in 1833, going thence 
to Louisville, Ky., to study law in the office of his 
elder brother, Larz, who was in active practice 
there with Henry Pirtle, afterwards so dis- 
tinguished as Chancellor of Louisville. 

Charles Anderson was admitted to the bar in 

35 



The Chenowetb MassacrB 

1835 and removed to Dayton, Ohio, wliere lie sub- 
sequently became prosecuting attorney, followed 
by election as State Senator. In politics, at that 
time, he was a Whig and a devoted follower of 
Henry Clay. He served several terms in the Leg- 
islature of Ohio. After his marriage he remained 
but a short time in Dayton, going to Cincinnati, 
where he formed a partnership with Rufus King, 
under the firm name of Anderson & King, which 
firm rapidly advanced to the front ranks of the 
Cincinnati bar. It is said that King attended to 
the preparation of the papers, while Anderson en- 
tered the forensic arena, soon becoming known for 
that eloquence of speech which afterwards made 
him famous. But he later developed asthma, 
which became a foe to his platform speeches for 
the remainder of his life, yet he made innumer- 
able speeches, though always burdened by the at- 
tacks of asthma. 

In the presidential campaign of 1856 he sup- 
ported Buchanan, rendering such valuable ser- 
vices in Kentucky and Ohio that he was tendered 
a foreign mission for his work, but had to decline 
because of his health, which became so indifferent 
that he was compelled to give up the law, remov- 
ing to the vicinity of San Antonio, Texas, to try 
the effect on his asthma of the change of climate, 
when he entered into live stock raising for occu- 
pation. Both changes proved to be successes. 

He kept out of politics in 1860, tho the next 
year became well known as a Union man. At the 
nullification meeting in Austin, he made so defi- 
nite a speech against the resolutions that he was 

36 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

arrested, being thrown into prison as a political 
prisoner. He was befriended by some Germans, 
assisted to escape, furnished with a hunting garb 
as a disguise, a rifle and an old gray horse. Shav- 
ing off his full beard, which he always wore, he 
darkened his sandy complexion, and made his es- 
cape into Mexico, thence he traveled to Havana 
and New York. After many adventures, his fam- 
ily finally reached him in Ohio. Not long after- 
wards he was sent by the United States on a con- 
fidential mission to England to that government, 
but did not remain long. In the summer of 1862 
he was made Colonel of the 93rd Ohio Infantry, 
served gallantly and was severely wounded at 
Stone River Dec. 31, 1862. The next summer, he 
was nominated for Lieutenant Governor of Ohio 
on the ticket with Gov. John Brough, which was 
successful. Gov. Brough died early in his admin- 
istration and Gov. Anderson served the term un- 
til 1866. The next year he removed to Lyon 
County, Ky., for his health, where he founded and 
built up the prosperous town of Kuttawa, which 
name he gave it to perpetuate one of the Indian 
names for the state. He lived to see it developed 
into a fine little city, beautified by his taste in 
using the natural advantages given to the site. 

Gov. Anderson was a man to love and be 
loved — he was the friend of the public schools 
wherever he went, he befriended the negro race 
just as he found them, having been the author of 
the bill in the Ohio Legislature that first gave the 
negro the right to testify in the courts of that 
State, before the war. 

37 



The Chenoweth Massacre 

He was an eloquent speaker, a ready and 
fluent writer and one of advanced ideas. 

He was a member of a most distinguished 
family, wliich he never forgot, yet never brought 
that fact into disagreeable prominence. The 
Clarks, Andersons, Logans and their descendants 
in Kentucky and Ohio, all came from the same 
stock. 

Loved and admired by his town-people, sur- 
rounded by his children and grand-children, he 
died at Kuttawa, Ky., September 2nd, 1895. 

John Chenoweth came to America from 
"Wales, in the year 1700, and settled in Baltimore. 
He married a Calvert, daughter of Lord Balti- 
more. He had two sons, Arthur and Richard. 
They both acquired land: Arthur first in 174J, 
afterwards in 1747 ; Richard in 1746. 

Arthur was born in 1716 and died in 1802. 

Arthur's children, James, John, Abraham, 
Thomas, Arthur, Richard and William. 

Richard's children: Gideon, Thomas, Mil- 
dred, James, Peggy, Polly, Levi, Anna, ISTaomi, 
and Tabitha. He was probably born about the 
year 1718. Came to Kentucky in 1778. James 
.^C V. Oh'enoweth being at that time three years 
^ /^old. This would make him sixty years of 
age when he landed at Corn Island. He was 
killed at a house-raising about the year 1793 or 
when 75 years of age. James Chenoweth was 
about ten years old at the time of the massacre 
of the family, which would make that event about 
the year 1788. And as his mother bore two child- 

38 



The Chenowetb Massacre 

ren after being scalped (Naomi and Tabitha), the 
death of his father was probably as late as 1793 
or '95. 

Taken from information furnished by Dr. 
Wm. J. Chenoweth, Sr., of Decatur, 111., now in 
his 86th year, great-grandson of Eichard Cheno- 
weth. Dr. Chenoweth has been for years accumu- 
lating items in the family history and the prob- 
abilities are that this is as near correct as can be 
found at the present time. 

March 9th, 1911. 

ALFRED PIRTLE. 



39 



Petition of the Inhabitants of Kentucke 



READ AUGUST 23. 1780 



VOL. 48. PAGE 347. RECORDS OF THE CONTINENTAL 

CONGRESS. MSS. STATE DEPARTMENT. 

WASHINGTON. D. C. 



COPIED FOR A. C. QUISENBERRY IN 1892 



PRESENTED TO KENTUCKY STATE HISTORICAL 
SOCIETY BY A. C. Q. 



CHAPTER I 

PETITION OF THE INHABITANTS OF 
KENTUCKE 



READ AUGUST 23, t780 



To the Honorable Continental Congress: 
The Petition of a number of the true and loyal 
subjects of the United States of America at large, 
most humbly Sheweth 

That your Petitioners having heretofore been 
Inhabiters of the different States of America 
since the commencement of the contest with Great 
Britain for the common cause of Liberty; have 
ventured their lives in a wild uncultivated part 
of the Continent on the Western Waters of Ohio 
called by general name of Kentuckey, where they 
have made improvements on what they allowed 
was King's unappropriated Lands, before the 
commencement of the said contest and that in the 
face of a savage enemy with the utmost hard- 
ships and in daily jeopardy of being inhumanly 
murdered — 

Your Petitioners further allowed that the 
Honorable Congress would allow them a Reason- 
able Retaliation in Lands for the sei'vices your 
Petitioners did in defending and settling, on their 

43 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 

own expense, the Country aforesaid to the weak- 
ening of the enemy and the strengthening the 
United States, whenever the common contest 
with Britain should be decided in favour of Amer- 
ica, — In the full assurance of which your Peti- 
tioners sold all their livings in the settled parts 
of the Cbntinent and have removed with their 
wives and families and all their effects to the 
Country aforesaid in order to take possession of 
their improvements aforesaid. — But when they 
came found almost all their Improvements 
granted away by a set of men which acted or 
pretended to act under the late Act of Virginia, 
which act also allowed large grants without any 
reserve of settling and improving the same. — 
By which means almost the whole of the lands in 
the Country aforesaid are engrossed into the 
hands of a few Interested men, the greater part 
of which live at ease in the internal parts of Vir- 
ginia, while your Petitioners are here with their 
wives and children daily exposed to the murders 
of the Savages to whom sundry of their Acquaint- 
ances has fell a sacrifice since their arrival 
though as yet but a short time. Again the late 
Alcts of Virginia require your Petitioners to take 
a new oath of allegiance to that State, renouncing 
all their Kings, Princes and States, and be true 
to the State of Virginia only, and the prospect of 
Military Government taking place shortly in this 
place give your Petitioners the greatest appre- 
hension of the most severe usage unless they com- 
ply with their mandates. — 

Your Petitioners considering all those griev- 

44 



Petition of Kentucky I'ioavers 

ances would gladly return into the settled parts 
of the Continent again, but having come seven 
hundred miles down the River Ohio with the ex- 
pence of the greater part of their fortunes find it 
impracticable to return back against the stream 
with their wives and children were they to suffer 
the most cruel death. 

Your Petitioners being drove to the extrem- 
ity aforesaid have but three things to choose. One 
is to tarry in this place, take the Oath of Allegi- 
ance to Virginia, and be true to that State only, 
and also become Slaves to those Engrossers of 
Lands, and to the court of Virginia. The other 
is to Remove down the River Ohio, and land on 
some part of Mexico and become subjects to the 
King of Spain. And the third to Remove them- 
selves over the River Ohio, with their 
wives, children and their small effects re- 
maining, which is now in possession of 
the Savage Enemy, to whom they are daily 
exposed to murders. The two former appear- 
ing to your Petitioners to have a Tendency to 
weaken the United States and as it were Banish 
the Common Cause of Liberty. Humbly pray the 
Honorable Continental Congress to grant them lib- 
erty of taking the latter choice and removing with 
their wives, families and effects to the Indian side 
of the Ohio and take possession of the same in the 
name of the United States of America at Large, 
where your Petitioners propose to support them- 
selves in an Enemy's Country on their own risque 
and expence, which they humbly conceive will 
have a tendency to weaken the power of the 

45 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Enemy, strengthen the United States at large, 
and advance the Common Cause of Liberty. 

Your Petitioners further pray the Honor- 
able Congress to allow them Liberty of making 
such Eegulations amongst themselves as they 
shall find necessary to govern themselves by, be- 
ing subject to the United States at large and no 
other States or power whatsoever — 

Your Petitioners humbly pray the Honorable 
Continental Congress to consider their case and 
grievances in their true light and grant them such 
Relief as they in their great wisdom shall see 
meet, and as your Petitioners in duty bound shall 
ever pray. 



Robt. Holmes 
Thos. Roach 
Allen Griffin 
George Power 
John Johnston 
Willm. Cumins 
Andrew Coin 
Richard Moore 
Jeremiah Johnston 
Albert Banta 
John Thickston 
Hugh Jackson 
George Coin 
Peter Demaree 
Jonathon Thickston 
John Banta 
Burgis White 
Jeremy Hardise 
William Sutherland 



William Drennen 
Robt. Brown 
John Shaw 
Edward Welsh 
Ephraim Gilding 
William Armstrong 
Jacob Banto 
Thos. Hart 
George Gilmore 
David Langhead 
James McElharton 
Thos. Cunningham 
Cornelius Banto 
Arthur Park 
James Burk 
George Cuavenston 
Anthony Jenkins 
Charles Mason 
Samuel Mason 
William Mitchell 



46 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Basil Stocker 
Willm. Galoway 
Jolm Glasher 
John Write 
Eduard Rewalno 
John Mitchell 
George Heal 
Jam«s Brown 
Charles Young 
Jas. Miller 
John Huewes 
William Brown 
Alex. Tutch 
William MitcheU 
Isaac Tun 
James Huard 
Lewis Hickman 
James Judy 
Samuel Kelly 
William Crenwell 
Philip Mjason 
Jas. Mathews 
John Galoway . 
Moses Williamson 
Mike T«ndenhasen 
John Ruth 
James Galoway 
Peter Young 
Abraham Bonta 
James Johnson 



Henry Woson 
John Brookil 
Samuel Griss 
Matthew Rogers 
John Cadlett 
William Mitchell 
Adam Row 
Hardy Hill 
Charles Black 
Patrick Gordon 
John William Province 
Frederick Bawfd 
Adin Harfcen 
William Sweden 
Edward Tyll 
David Johnson 
Evan Wilson 
John Borland 
Benjamin Lin 
Jacob Conaway 
Jeremiah Trefar 
Joseph Kenig 
Joseph Wm. Province 
John Williamson 
Benjamin Hook 
Joseph Vanmatar 
John Turner 
John Keath 
John Jail 
Samuel Harris 



Thos. Johnson Cornelius 

Henry Hoos John Redley 

Cornelius Vorhes John Miller 



47 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Henry Wade 
Stephen Han-is 
Joseph Green 
Michel Woods 
Jesse Crark 
John Mayhue Haris 
John Green 
Andrew Dodds 
Joseph Grifinwalt 

Harris 

Austen Miller 
Roeheb Kenedy 
Adam Grounds 
James Haris 
Samuel Mason 
Thomas Collings 
John Felty 
Thos. Welch 
Thos. Putnam 
Thos. Putnam 
John Williams 
Frederick Fox 
John Campbell 
Samuel Wadmes 
George Rays 
Jonathan Gunningham 
Charles Masterson 
Benjamin Caselman 
Francis Roach 
William Burnes 
Joseph Borth 
John Baley 
David Kirkwood 



Daniel James 
John Light 
Andrew Gradey 
William Weelweed 
William Lookn 
William Little 
Seneca McRakin 
James Gilmore 
James Delany 
Jonathan Harned 
James Adams 
Samuel Gilmore 
John Greenben 
Samuel Wells 
William Logsden 
James Logan 
Martin Stull 
Peter Newkirk 
David McQuale 
John Logan 
John Martin 
Tobias Newkirk 
William Lin 
John Massey 
Robert Gilmore 
Moses Cane 
Adam Money 
Fduard Poomes 
Jacob Westeroeb 
John Nelson 
Gerardis Rekid 
Peter Buszard 
John Jones 



48 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Ezekiel Hickman 
John Cline 
Jasyrk Greenwalt 
Thos. Applegate 
Thomas Banfield 
David Beach 
John Unsel 
Michol Paull 
Thomas Patten 
Thomas Stansbury 
Mikel Toetus 
William Irwin 
William Welch 
Joint' Vantreas 
William Onie 
Joseph Qurteronus 
Niclos Thirly 
John McGee 
John James 
Peter Pohone 
Mathew Logan 
Thomas Hargis 
John Capps 
Joseph Borth 
Samuel Felin 
John Moore 
Elisha Qurtermus 
John Light 
John McLam 
Henry Brenton 
Samuel Gordon 
James Dunbar 
tini Swell 



Reuben Blackford 
John Wilkeson 
Matthias Hbok 

Newkirk 

John Finn 
Dinis Davis 
George Hinch 
Nathan Sellad 
Jacob Funk 
Joseph McClintock 
James Steward 
Thomas Pownser 
Geo. Steward 
John Pringle 
Joseph Inlow 
Jacob Spears 
Abraham Rammod 
James Anderson 
William Bennett 
Abraham Powell 
James Johnson 
Joseph Kirkpatrick 
James Hamilton 
Mathew Jaferes 
Samuel Watkins 
John Moires 
Jacob Barkman 
John Kenedy 
John Hamilton 
Daniel Spears 
Edward Irwin 
John Miller 
William Ewing 



49 



Petition of Kentuckj Pioneers 



Benjamin Doslie 
John Irwin 
Adam Wall 
James Boys 
George Black 
Elijah Hart 
Michal Thomas 
Joseph Sulavan 
John Sumet 
Thos. Spencer 
Michael Little 
Jacob Brennon 
Thomas Boyd 
Paul Humble 
John Seller 
Thos. Dillen 
Eudulph Hufenan 
Daniel Jones 
Nathan Sellers 
Jacob Huffman 
David Brinton 
Kobe Hamilton 
Christian Hufman 
Joseph Olden 
John Stuart 
Jacob Coseman 
Conrad Carito 
Jacob Salmon 
Jas. McLoughlin 
William Winter 
John Gross 
John Yery 
Samuel Lee 



John Beson 
Charles West 
Martin Colmore 
Jas. Dougherty 
Benjamin Ooselman 
John West 
Charles Crump 
TJlunik Heonbunk 
Elward Listen 
Martin Kurtz 
Jacob Dosson 
John Cleer 
John Liston 
Peter Bordmess 
Jacob Doom 
Josey Stuart 
Josiah Walis 
James Foye 
Samuel Glass 
John Averill 
John White 
Mickel Kintner 
John Little 
Peter Loves 
John Ainwin 
Peter Paul 
David Davis 
Denis Downing 
John Dongen 
John Williams 
James Hamilton 
Isaac Boulden 
Charles Davis 



50 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Herman Greathouse 
Thos. Whithedge 
Moses Speed 
Joseph Grundee 
Smith Harsborough 
David Hockins 
Joseph Tumblestone 
Wiliam Averall 
Jas. Brown 
Harrison Averall 
Joseph Little 
William Hopkins 
John Tumlinson 
William Collings 
Daniel Williams 
(2) William Collings 
Jesse Tumlinson 
George Grundy 
John Ligwald 
Thos. Phillips 
William Rice 
Thomas Stone 
Benjamin Tamlinson 
Thos. Senderson 
Thos. Cavet 



William Clave 
Cornelius Bogard 
Henry Campbell 
Joshua Cleaver 
Samuel Dunn 
John Puck 
Robert Brusler 
Francis Daves 

G d Campbell 

James McKee 
Robert Thirkman 
John Hase 
Samuel Thirkman 
Hector Simpson 
William Lawrence 
John Wager 
George Clark 
Isaac Froman 
Michal Kirkham 
Paul Froman 
George Taylor 
Joseph Mounts 
John Hunt 
Jas. McCollach 
James Campbell 



Petition of the Inhabitants 

of Kentucke 

Read August 23, 1780. 



52 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Spencer Collings 
Henry Richards 
-Cumfort Busier 
Robert Insworth 
Christian Schultz 
Thos. Dowdoll 
Henry Hanglan 
John Frigas 
George Reading 
James Purse 
Honkerson Ashby 
Joseph Brown 
Thos. Talbot 
Joseph Thompson 
Samuel Miller 
John Johnson 
Joseph Liston 
Thos. Pursel 
Frederick Dunpeld 
Reuben Cass 
Isaac White 
Aaron Rawlings 
Solomon Resiner 
Judiah Huntington 
Charles Bilderbok 
James Neavil 
Charles Dunkin 
Thos. Kennedy 
Jacob Bilder 
Ainasa Frisel 
George Crist 
Dinues Pursel 
Gabriel Melted 



William Houghland 
William Collings 
Benjamin Byard 
John Lee 
John Houghland 
I^enry Prayted 
John Townspend 
George Cueard 
Squier Boon 
John Rice 
Benjamin Patten 
Benjamin Cleaver 
John Heast 
Theophilus Coxe .. 
William Harker/v^^^ 
Thos. Hamilton 
Zachariah Holder 
Jas. Purseley 
Jacob Bilderbak 
Mashesh Carter 
David Hawkins 
Hugh Begarstof 
William Chraven 
William Greathouse 
Zacheric Dye 
Joseph Johnston 
John Thompson 
Charles Secomp 
John Hunter 
John Greathouse 
John Grundy 
Robert Sweny 
James Thompson 



51 



CHAPTER II 

MEMORIAL AND PETITION OF THE 
PIONEERS OF 1782-1783. 



To the Honorable President and Delegates of the 
Free United States of America in Congress 
assembled : 

The memorial and Petition of a number of 
Inhabitants of Kentuckey Settlement of the Low 
Dutch Reformed Church persuasion in behalf of 
themselves and other intended settlers. 
Humbly Sheweth 

That in the Spring 
of the year 1780 they moved to Kentuckey with 
their families and effects, with a view and ex- 
pectation to procure a tract of land to enable them 
to settle togeather in a body for the conviency of 
civil society and propogating the Gospel in their 
known language; when they arrived there to 
their sorrow and disappointment they were, thro' 
the dangerousness of the times by a cruel savage 
enemy oblidged to settle in Stations or Forts in 
such places where there was the most appear- 
ance of safety, notwithstanding all their caution 
numbers of them suffered greatly in their prop- 
erty, several killed and others captivated by the 
enemy, living in such distressed confined way al 

55 



Petition of Kentucky PioDeera 

ways in danger, frequently on Military duty, it 
was impossible for them to do more than barely 
support their families with the necessaries of life. 
by which means they are much reduced, and 
what adds more to their disappointment and af- 
fliction is that, contrary to their expectations be- 
fore their arrival and since, the most or all the 
Tillable Land has been Located and monopolized 
by persons that had the advantage of your Me- 
morialists by being acquainted with the country, 
and your Memorialists being strangers and con- 
fined as aforesaid, and being so reduced are ren- 
dered unable to purchase Land at the advanced 
price, and especially in a body conveniently to- 
gether agreeable to their wishes. 

Whereas, Providence has been pleased to 
prosper and support the virtuous resistance of 
the United States in the glorious cause of Liberty, 
which has enabled them to obtain an Honorable 
Peace whereby they have obtained a large extent 
of unappropriated Territory. And whereas, it is 
currently and repeatedly reported amongst its 
that Congress has broke or made void Virginia's 
right or claim to Land in Kentuckey Settlement. 

Your Petitioners therefore humbly pray (in 
behalf of themselves and other intended settlers 
of that persuasion) the Honourable Congress 
would indulge them with a grant of a Tract or 
Territory of Land in Kentuckey Settlemt. : if the 
Virginia Claim thereto should be made void, or 
otherwise in the late ceeded land on the North 
west side of the Ohio river ; whereto there is not 
any prior legal claim to enable them to settle in 

56 



Petition of Kentuckj Pioneers 

a body together, on such reasonable terms as Con- 
gress in their wisdom and prudence shall see just 
and reasonable, they complying with and perform- 
ing all reasonable conditions required, to enable 
them to put their intended plan in purpose and 
execution, they having principally in view the 
''Glory of Gk)d," the promotion of Civil and re- 
ligious society, educating and instructing their 
rising generation in the principals of religion 
and morality; hoping the Honorable Congress 
will give all due encouragement to such a laudable 
undertaking. The premises duly considered. 

Your Petitioners as in duty bound shall ever 
pray, &c. 

Inhabitens. 
Hendreck Banta John Vorhis, Jun. 

Benedick Yury Luke Vorhis 

Henery Yury Samuel Demaree 

Peter Demaree Peter Demaree, Jun. 

Cornelius Bogart Henry Shively 

John Demaree Saml. Demaree, Jr. 

Cornelius Banta John Vancleave 

Samuel Durie John Harris 

Albert Durie Peter Banta 

Marga widow Samuel Westervelt 

• ' Durie, widow Mary Westervelt (widow) 

Daniel Banta Saml. Lock 

Albert Vorhis David Allen 

Intended Friends 

■ Armstrong John Voreis 

Samuel Banta William Seaboum 

John Vanasdale Simon Vunosdol 

James Cook Derrick Conine 

S7 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 

Sophia Voreis (widow) John O'Bieanes 



Bergen Conert 
Francis 



Derrick Kooesen 

Aaron Rawlings 

Peter Wickoff 

John Ryker 

Henry Bogart 

Correlius Voreis 

James Westervelt 

Henry Banta, Jr. 

Tunes Vanpelt 

Abraham Banta, Jr. 

Andrew Shoe 

Peter Banta, Jr. 

Mattis Shoe 

John Banta 

Garrit Vanarsdale 

William Vancleave 

Joseph debaen 

Catherine Darling (widow) 

Abraham debaen William Jervel 

Lambert Darling Peter Seabourn 

Peter Banta John Monfort 

John Darling Oeorge Seabourn 

Cornelius Conzine, Jun.John Monfort, Jr. 

James Voreis David Seabourn 

John Conzine Francis Cossaart 

Johanna Seburn (widow) 

Lucas Vanarsdale Jacob Seabourn 

Albert Banta Jacob Cossart 

Barney Smock Simon VanArsdol 

Jacob Banta George Brinkerhof 



Abraham Banta 
Peter Monfoort 
James Stagg 
Garret Dorland 
George Burnett 
Jaquish Vantine 
Daniel Brower 
Francis Monfort 
Rulef Vorhis 
Samuel Demarest 
John Brewer 
John Knight 
Daniel Brewer, Jr. 
John Conrad Knight 
Henry Comminger 

John Comminger 
Martin Neavons 
Samuel Bogart 



58 



Petition of Kentucky Pioneers 



Peter Carmicle 
Jacobus Monfort 
John VanArsdol 
Cornelius Cosyne 
John Bodine 
Cornelius Vorhis 
John Smock 
Cornelius Tueb 
Maties Smock 
Laurens Tueb 
John Kip 

Lawrence Montfort 
Barney Kipp 

Abraham 

Abraham DeGraff 
Gilbert Brinkerhoff 
Thos. Johnson 
Luke Brinkerhoff 
Abraham Johnson 
Andrew Conine 
Andrew Johnson 
John Persyl 
Thomas Vantine 
Cornelius Demaree 

Brinkerhoff 

Cornelius D. Lowe 
Jacob Brinkerhoff 



George Hall 
John Oten 
Begun Spader 
Adrian Oten 
Jacob Orbacow 
John Oten 
Samuel Briten 
Peter Monfort, Senior 
Cornelius Oten 
Wilhelmas Houghtelin 
George Williamson 
Abraham Houghtelin 
Richer Berssly 
Hezekiah Hioughtelin 
John huls 

James 

Daniel Haris 
Charles Vantine 
Benjamin Sloot 
Mikel DeGraft 
Jacob Smock 
William De Graff 
Gilbert Lowe 
John Cownoven 
David Cossart 
Peter Vandyke 
Henry Stryker 



59 



l£Je12 



